Sunday, August 27, 2006

Pennant Race Baseball is Driving me to Drink

Two weekends ago it was vodka sours. Last weekend it was my mojitos (they paled in comparison to my dad's, by the way). And last night I nursed an entire bottle of wine during the Twins game. Basically, since the Twins made their way back onto the radar for the wild card and even the division, Dean and I have been turning to alcohol to calm our viscous nerves. Even when the majority of my face was numb, my stomach had knots twisting and turning. I don't know if I'll make it to October. And when Joe Nathan gave up the two-run homer last night I thought my world would end. Fortunately, I had no disillusion about today's game. After the score was 6-1, I retired to nap.

Dean, usually the less responsible of the two of us, is threatening to go on a mission to dry us out. We can't sustain this way, and September can be a long month. Nothing is getting done around the house. What little energy we are left with on Sunday afternoons after a hard night of drinking and pulling out our hair is spent dumping empty bottles into a garbage bag, and wiping up the syrupy residue off the countertops from the various mixers.

Why do we struggle so much on Sundays? It all goes back to the difference between a juvenile hangover and an adult hangover. You see, when you are in your late teens and early twenties, a hangover can be cured with 14 hours of sleep, a couple Advil and a Tremendous Twelve from Perkins. Not so when you hit your mid twenties. It is one of nature's horrible ironies that when you become legally able to drink, you become physically unable to. An adult hangover starts innocent enough. You wake up with a pounding headache, but you think "If that's as bad as it's going to be, I can handle it." But it's NOT. An adult hangover gets progressively WORSE as the day goes on. The extreme fatigue sets in a couple hours later, and nausea sets in mid afternoon. By late afternoon, you are a total blob of uselessness saying "Either I need to drink much less or much more." Finally, feeling defeated by early evening, you must reconcile yourself to the fact that today is wasted, and as an adult that is the worst part of the whole hangover. No cleaning, no running errands or organizing the closets. If you are lucky this is it. On the rare occasion though, I have experienced the two-day adult hangover with the second day starting where the first left off.

Thus Dean, being fed up with uselessness, slothfulness and the frustrated feeling that while a Tremendous Twelve sounds really good he just doesn't think he could keep it down, says next weekend needs to be alcohol free. And I agree.

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Now, a couple of you have noticed the new link that I put in on the side bar. I originally got this idea from Jackie, who has a link explaining who she is talking about during any given story. I thought this was a really good idea and Friday, which was another excruciatingly slow day at work, I set out to do something similar. I decided to just add on a new blog, and make it a "Reader's Guide" to satisfy my throngs of readers. I think it says more than my profile and that way someone stumbling across this website can know just what it's about, and those that keep coming back can easily click on the side if they forget who someone is (since I get tired of always reintroducing the people in my life). If you have a minute check it out and let me know what you think!

As for hangovers, I usually save Vicoden from various injuries, since real pain doesn't bother me too much. But for hangovers, Vicoden baby, yeah!

I liked your bio. The link thing is a good idea. I stress about getting rid of old links, especially to blogs where I am still linked. But ya gotta do what you gotta do. If I don't visit, then why link them?

runnergirl~When its becoming a (decidedly bad) habit, you need an excuse.

jackie~Thanks! You were part of the inspiration!

lefty~The whole NL is mediocre. The Marlins, who are still very much in the race for the wild card are under .500! It may be stressful on the fans, but I think ultimately it makes for a better season when most the teams are at the same level. Unfortunately, I think the lop-sidedness of the AL will win out in the World Series.

scott~Goodness, you don't mess around, do you? I still have some T3 leftover from my various ER trips in the winter. I should try that. I'm surprised it doesn't leave you with a different sort of hangover.Thanks!

Maybe I'll be a Twins fan for the rest of the season. Any successful team with a low payroll is worth rooting for. And Tony Oliva, Rod Carew and Harmon Killibrew, baseball heroes of my youth, used to play for you guys. Right there's another reason.